Really, the Whole Cohen Thing Is Just a Big Nothingburger

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Remember a few months ago when Rudy Giuliani casually admitted on the Hannity show that Donald Trump had paid hush money to keep Stormy Daniels quiet about their affair? Then the next day he said it was all a big mistake and he hadn’t really meant any of it? Everybody went nuts. It was a bizarre clusterfuck even by Trumpian standards, and no one could figure out how and why it happened.

I think now we know. Consider this tidbit yesterday from John Hinderaker:

Today’s legal developments unquestionably represent a step forward for the Democrats….But in principle, there is no reason why they should change the landscape. Manafort’s conviction has nothing to do with Trump. And no matter how Mueller may try to dress it up with talk about campaign finance—which voters don’t care about, anyway—the Cohen plea simply confirms what we already knew–that Trump tried to keep Stephanie Clifford quiet. That may be a big deal to Melania, I can’t speak for her. But I doubt that it is a big deal to a significant number of voters, and I doubt that tomorrow’s headlines will move the needle on the midterm election.

You see what happened there? There’s nothing new here. We already knew all about Stormy. This just adds some obscure campaign finance stuff that no one cares about except for a few lawyers.

That’s how it works: you let the news drop early so everyone has time to absorb it and move on. Then, when Cohen officially admits Trump knew all about the payoff, it gets some big headlines but it’s basically old news. All that’s left is to go on TV and muddy the waters about how every campaign has some finance violations because campaign finance law is so complex. It’s really nothing that hasn’t happened before a hundred times. We’ll let the green eyeshade guys work it out.

Now then: who wants to talk about those WHITE FARMERS whose land is being BRUTALLY EXPROPRIATED by the BLACK government in South Africa? And white farmers have been MURDERED! That’s what we should be outraged about, amirite?

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

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